Mohinder, Jealous?
by The Alciontae Shadow
Summary: What happens in the M3 house when Matt goes on a date?  I do not own these characters, they belong to others with the imaginations of Gods!


"Tie?"

"Check."

"Blazer?"

"Check"

"Wallet?"

"Check. Anything else I need?" Matt looked carefully around the room, his mind going over everything that should or should not be in his pockets before he left the apartment.

"Shirt, shoes, and everything else. I believe you are ready to be off, Matt." Mohinder smiled nervously at his…roommate… and backed out of Matt's room, his mind a loop of teas he wanted to find for Molly to try. "Just don't forget to pick the lady up, and you will be fine."

The detective followed him into the hallway, pausing long enough to set a large hand casually on Mohinder's shoulder. He stood that way for a minute, looking closely at the other man's face, obviously trying very hard not to read his mind. When no answers were forthcoming from mere observation, though, he started to get that concentrated look on his face and Mohinder panicked.

"You'll be late!" He stepped back and moved into the kitchen, automatically pulling out his dented kettle and filling it with water to boil. As the stove's fire licked at the blackened kettle, Mohinder began methodically cleaning the few dishes in the sink, leaving most to drip-dry on the counter. The mug and spoon he had been targeting he dried himself before setting precisely one inch from the edge of the counter's corner and from one another. As Matt watched, perplexed, Mohinder retrieved the milk and sugar containers before also placing them exactly the same distance as the mug and teaspoon. He adjusted the sugar dish minutely before sighing and sagging into a chair.

When Mohinder had managed to ignore him another two minutes without moving, Matt decided the game was lost and muttered good-bye before walking out. In his head, Mohinder heard a faint, _I won't be home late…_as the door quietly shut behind the solid police officer.

_Home? Why do you have to leave home at all?_ Mohinder silently asked the absent man, his face crumpling when he heard that word, home. He stared at the door, waiting for Matt to come back through it, smiling and saying he had been 'joshin' and wasn't really going on a date with a fellow officer from the precinct. A fellow _female_ officer, no less.

_I knew better than to think anything about you, Matthew Parkman. I knew that nothing good could come of me wanting you as I do. _The kettle whistled angrily at the geneticist at that point, cutting short any other conversation he might have wanted to have with himself. Instead he busied himself with pouring exactly the right amount of water for the right amount of tea for the right amount of milk for the right amount of sugar. After he had stirred it exactly ten times clockwise, he rinsed the teaspoon and set it in the center of the clean sink and sat down once more, the cup seeping warmth into his frozen hands.

A door opening not long after jarred Mohinder from his reverie and he immediately looked to the door of the small apartment, hoping to see Matt's bear-like frame filling the frame. No such luck. A small hand touched his arm, stroking his wrist and drawing his attention to his daughter's face, a comforting look forced upon it. Before Molly could speak a single word, she was engulfed in a strong hug.

"He doesn't like her that much." The words were muffled, but Mohinder didn't think he could believe them.

"What?"

This time Molly was able to move Mohinder's arm from in front of her mouth, the tiny lips carefully forming the words in case her father's reason had suddenly gone south for the winter. "She asked him and he thought it would help him get over that woman." Molly refused to use Janice's name. It didn't matter that Janice leaving Matt was the reason he was now able to be one of her fathers. That woman had hurt not only her hero, but her father and that was unacceptable to her ten-year old values.

"Molly, how-"

"He told me at breakfast this morning." Molly smiled in the superior way only children are capable of accomplishing and hurried on before Mohinder could even think of chastising Matt later. "I don't think he really knew he was doing it. He was really telling his Lucky Charms… I just heard him…"

Again, Mohinder pulled his little girl into a deep hug before setting her on his knee. "It's ok. But I think it is time for you to go to bed." He paused for a moment as he realized that she knew he was upset about Matt's date. "And I just don't want anything upsetting this family, Molly. I don't want you to have to get used to Matt and I and then bring another person into it." He stopped at the look on her face, knowing how ridiculous his excuses sounded, even to his deluded self. "Never mind. It is bed time for both of us."

Molly had gone to bed easily, teeth brushed, hair combed, face scrubbed clean. Mohinder had read her her bedtime story almost desperately, needing the comfort of a routine activity to pull him from his morose state. It lasted as long as it took for him to pass Matt's bedroom door.

Instead of going to bed, he had splayed himself over the couch, research in piles around him.

Stubble scraped against his hand as he stared irritably at the pile of papers involving people with mental abilities. The file at the top of the stack was Matthew Parkman's, followed by Molly Walker's and then moving on to unknowns. Matthew Parkman. Telepath. Police officer. No. Police detective. Single. Father. Good man.

Mohinder Suresh had an equation for his life. Precisely this plus exactly that equaled this probable conclusion. Nowhere in his life equation was Matthew Parkman supposed to become an important element other than where Molly was concerned. Matthew Parkman was not completely physically fit. He was not intellectual. He could not cook. He had hardly ever traveled. He was not supposed to be desirable by Mohinder. And when Mohinder did desire him, he was not supposed to go on a date with someone else. Because he knew he himself was an attractive man. He didn't flaunt it; he was good about not thinking too much of his physical attributes because he lived in a world of intellectuals, but he knew that he could potentially get any man or woman he wanted.

Even as Mohinder became increasingly indignant with Matt for being supposedly oblivious to his obvious attractions, he found himself also becoming disturbingly jealous of Matt's nameless date. Why would he try with this woman who didn't even know him, didn't know or understand his abilities, when he could be with Mohinder, a scientist who could even help him develop his, to be quite cheesy, powers? The answer would not come to the intellectual man and he sat there, stewing over a loop of how blind _is_ the man and why can't that woman just disappear so he'll want me.

A mere hour later, Matt's key turned in the lock, startling Mohinder from his trance. When he walked in the door, it was to be treated to a look of guilt from his roommate who sat amidst a disaster zone of file folders and unintelligibly scrawled notes. Wide chocolate eyes blinked owlishly at him over the couch top, seeming not to actually see him.

"You think loud, Doc. I could hear you from downstairs." Matt smiled tiredly as he meticulously hung up his coat in the place Mohinder had designated for him. "Interesting stuff, too."

_Nonononononononono!_ _There is a perfectly good explanation. I was thinking about someone else. Molly and I watched a movie- that one is not even plausible to you, Mohinder Suresh, and Matt is never going to believe you…_

Matt's smile widened as he saw that Mohinder knew he had heard the last collection of thoughts as well. Even more obvious was the silence that followed. In some it might be considered that they were merely blocking the telepath out. In this case, in Mohinder's case, it was apparent that he had panicked; now thinking nothing.

"Why didn't you say something sooner?"

Mohinder continued to stare blankly at him, his mouth dropping open to join his eyes on the floor. Matt shook his head, scrubbing a hand through his hair before stepping forward until he was right next to the stunned geneticist, carefully not stepping on one of the piles. His large hands reached down and he effortlessly picked the thinner man up off of the couch and set him standing on the ground next one of the kitchen chairs. When he did not sit down of his own will, Matt gently pushed him and he fell back. Guffawing softly, the larger man moved to the cupboard where he pulled out two clean mugs, the tin of chamomile tea, and a teaspoon. The sugar and milk were still where Mohinder left them and Matt clucked his tongue disapprovingly as he poured the spoiled milk down the sink. That done, he placed the mugs and the teaspoon. Precisely one inch apart from the corner of the counter and one another.

"You don't have to do that." The voice is startling in its suddenness.

"I know, Doc. I did it because I know it sometimes helps you relax. If it doesn't, then at least you know I noticed and remembered. But, if it does help you relax…"

And then that big bear of a man is behind Mohinder and both hands on are his shoulders and he can't even remember what he had been thinking ten minutes ago. The absence of those hands leave him feeling chilled until he sees Matt before him again, kettle once more filled and turning cherry-red with heat. And that, more than anything completely breaks him out of his brief catatonia.

"What do you mean, why didn't I say something sooner? First you and that woman," Mohinder grimaces at Matt's smile when he uses Molly's phrase, "and then you announce out of nowhere that you are going on a date with some other woman. When should I have mentioned this?"

"It doesn't matter any more." Mohinder's throat gurgled angrily at that and Matt hurried on with his reasoning. "Because now I know. Because I heard."

_And now I lose everything I thought I had gained…_

"No." Those hands settled once more on his shoulders, warm, heavy, large, and in charge. "You aren't going to lose _anything_. Unless things go faster than they usually do." A deep chuckle sounded in his ear, hearty and heavy with some kind of promise. A promise Mohinder wasn't sure he completely understood. He started to turn towards that breath against his ear when a piercing whistle screeched throughout the apartment, startling him enough to make him jump. A low crack followed the screech and Matt's hands left his shoulders to cover his bleeding nose.

Towels, napkins, and even the tablecloth Molly had picked out at the grocery store ended up pressed against Matt's nose as Mohinder pulled a package of frozen pizza rolls out of the freezer. Suddenly, he is himself once more, albeit slightly pink around the edges, and he clinically places the bag of frozen fat directly in the center of Matt's neck telling him to lean forward, not back, and let the cold do its job. He then actually looks at the words on the bag placed on his roommate's neck.

"You weren't going to…reheat…these were you?" The distaste colors the tone of his words, as if he didn't want to believe the possibility were even there. "They aren't even real food."

"Yesb I vasb. Dey're finb." Matt panicked as blood leaked out of his nose and Mohinder didn't say anything. Seeing his own blood sometimes affected Matt in odd ways. Verbiage was one of those effects. "Molly wanned dem!"

"She wanted no such thing, Matthew. Those are for you and I know it." He carefully checked the gobs of paper covering Matt's face and then thankfully pulled the layers away to reveal blood-streaked skin but no more flowing freely from his nose. Once the crisis was averted, Mohinder became nervous once more, quickly moving to the hot kettle of water and the waiting mugs. "How did you know to choose the chamomile?"

Shrugging, Matt sat down and allowed Mohinder to ready the tea. "It's the one you always get when you do…" He waved his hand in the direction of the counter corner, "that. I just figured that it would help. We don't have to talk tonight, you know. We can wait until the morning when we've both had some rest and time to think."

Mohinder handed him his mug and sat down across the table. "I think it would be best if we talked a little tonight and a little in the morning." He reached a fine-boned hand over the table and placed it on top of Matt's larger, rougher one. The touch was electric, but comforting. The best part, though, was when Matt's hand turned over and curled up around his.


End file.
